


Closer

by tenderguns



Series: Ruiner [5]
Category: At Dead Of Night (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, NIN title except i'm running out of songs from the downward spiral lmao, Other, better be bc maya fuckin isn't, ghosts being great, jimmy is so manipulative and for what, maya why do i do these things to you, qwallin awl jaya shippers there's a kiss are youse happy now, this is the big sad ending i promised, what an assclown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-19 06:21:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29746296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tenderguns/pseuds/tenderguns
Summary: This is the story of a single flame that burns the Halls to the ground.
Relationships: Jimmy Hall | Hugo Punch & Maya, Jimmy Hall | Hugo Punch/Maya, one sided Jimmy/Maya
Series: Ruiner [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2181951
Comments: 10
Kudos: 38





	Closer

Cradled in the claustrophobic belly of the first floor, Maya runs with a level of freedom entirely new to her. Surely Jimmy will have assumed she's gone as far away from him as possible. Surely she's bought herself a head start.

No such luck. She hears the _thunk_ of the elevator and startles, an electric wash of pain branching like lighting up both her legs. As soon as he's out, he's calling for her, his voice low and hoarse. She can hear the note of restraint in it, and shivers. _Move, Maya._

But the phosphenes are back, and it's so hard, so hard to want to. 

_But your friends, Maya._

So she keeps going, teeth gritted, moving fast and close to the walls. His footsteps are heavier than hers. She has an advantage here. She's leaning on it with all her weight, making turns she shouldn't, the floor layout turned labyrinthine in the kaleidoscope of her vision. _When I find someone, I can stop and rest, and then I'll be okay,_ she tells herself, but there's no denying that she's slowing. Looking back over her shoulder, she sees his shadow slinking back around the corner, and lets out a tiny, worn groan, panting as she pushes herself to the limit of her speed.

Making a final turn, Maya braces herself against the first door she sees, but her stomach sinks when she sees the room number. 105. It's the wrong dead end. The floorboards creak under Jimmy's feet, muffled by the plush carpet, so close she can hear the rasp of his breathing. No time to turn back. She lets herself in and locks the door, immediately crouches to look through the peep-hole. Nothing, but this isn't new. Just as she's turning to consider a place to hide - what hasn't she tried yet? - he speaks to her, as if for once he means for her to listen.

"Maya, you know it's not worth hiding anymore."

His voice is softer than she'd anticipated, lower. Intimate. Almost bemused. "You're going to have to open the door at some point."

Its proximity is close, but not immediate. She scours the range of the spy-glass, but can't see so much as a shadow. He's lurking outside her line of sight.

"Why should I? You have the master key," she says, a little recklessly, her voice bitter. "Open it yourself."

"I want you to come out here yourself. I want to know that you understand."

"Understand what?" Maya tries to control the rising note of hysteria in her voice. "That you're going to kill me either way?"

Jimmy sighs from the other side of the door, a little closer now. She strains to see him, but he's still out of sight. 

"Be a good girl, Maya, and keep quiet. I have to explain something to you."

She sinks to her knees on the floor, leaning her forehead against the door. "Make it quick, please." 

A faint snort. "You already know, Maya, that something has... taken hold of me. The same thing that took hold of Hugo. But I have done something Hugo never could. I have... fought it."

Maya listens, her body alive with tremors. She is so cold, so tired, so done. But she listens.

"Let me make it very clear, I didn't win, Maya. But neither did... _it_. I am... new. Like myself, but... stronger."

Maya draws in a long, shaking breath, wrapping her arms around herself. _Oh, god. Oh, my god._

Jimmy's voice lifts slightly, brightening, drifting off into a dreamy haze. "I think I could be a god, Maya."

"Jimmy, this is too much," she pleads, her voice barely above a whisper. "I don't know what you want me to do.

"I want you to _listen_." His voice is edged with a warning. "Look, I'm not going to hurt you unless you make me. I'm _trying_ to tell you that you're safe now, Maya." A pause, and his voice takes on that dreamy tone again. "I can save you now."

Maya only realises that she's been hitting her forehead against the door when it sends pain shooting through her temple. She gives out a strangled yelp at the shock of it, and instinctively clamps her hands over her mouth, realising the second she does so that it's futile. She's stuck here. There's not even a point in hiding. _Save me?_ She lets out another broken noise from the back of her throat, this one closer to a sob, and she hears Jimmy sigh - what, pity? - from the hallway.

"Don't cry, Maya. You can't start crying _now_." His voice is petulant, as if she's not playing along with his game the way he wants. "You've fought so hard. Don't you want to keep fighting?"

"I don't want to fight you. I want to- I want to go _home._ I want to get to my friends and go home."

Jimmy sighs again, this time in resignation. "I'm afraid I can't let you do that. But you can have something better, Maya. If you open the door, I can show you just how much better things can get for you. Remember, I wont hurt you unless you force my hand. But there may be a time where that seems to be the only option. So, if I might suggest your next move, I think it would suit you better to open the door."

"Please," Maya whispers, more to herself than to Jimmy. She closes her eyes, flattens her hand against the door. _My friends. Maybe I can bargain for my friends._ In her heart, she knows they are worth risking danger for. She can barely keep herself upright as she presses herself up to full height. "Jimmy, I think if you hit me again, it might kill me."

"I wouldn't hurt you for the world right now, Maya. There's too much to do." He pauses, and she hears him pace back and forth. "So much you're going to help me with."

 _I go the wolf as a lamb,_ she thinks, and it's so absurd that it's what finally allows her to open the door. The full force of her decision knocks the breath out of her as it swings open. She steps forward, balling her hands into fists as a pale imitation of what she used to be. As soon as she turns her head, she sees him; spinning on his heel as he paces, hands mercifully empty. Her throat is seized by panic, and her ankles threaten to give as he faces her. She is ripe for slaughter. She puts her hands out in front of her as if it will help hold back a man with more than a foot on her in height, and at this Jimmy's face softens into a mask of concern.

"Oh, you poor thing," Jimmy says, and Maya breaks.

She coils into herself. She can feel herself retreating, and can't bring herself to pull back. She can't even bring herself to cry. She just stares into his face, trembling, while he moves towards her, and the last of her melts away. She lets him take her by the shoulder, direct them to turn. They walk in silence, save for Jimmy's occasional mutterings of things like _such a good girl, doing so well_ and _I just knew you'd be worth it._ At some point, as she sees room 101 ahead of them and knows she's going back in, she feels herself flush hot all over, and warm tears begin to slip silently down her face. She begins to shake her head erratically, opens her mouth to try and speak, but whatever she was going to say is drowned out by Jimmy quietly shushing her, his grip tightening. As he twists the knob for Maya's room and pushes it open, he doesn't even have to hold her in place to stop her from running. She allows herself to be led in.

As soon as they're both in the room, she moves away from him, half-falling on to the bed and backing herself against the headboard. She watches Jimmy as he deadbolts the door, a distant sickening feeling sinking in her stomach. When he turns around, he registers her expression, and gives her a wink. He flattens his back against the door, further shutting her out to the world, and considers her thoughtfully.

“You know, you’ve been rather… dogged, haven’t you, Maya. All of that business with locking me in rooms. Hitting me with that tray. Hiding and fighting. You’re too tenacious for your own good.”

Maya stares at him. In a better state she might have appeased him with a smile.

"It's almost a shame to have knocked you around so much, so to speak." He laughs brightly, and for a moment Maya remembers when she first arrived at this godforsaken place, how she hated the way he looked at her from the very start.

She clears her throat, swallows deeply. "You could have left me alone," she offers.

"Ah, but I couldn't, not then! I wasn't the man I am now, you remember. Silly girl," He chuckles. 

He moves towards where she sits slumped on the bed, and Maya flattens herself defensively against the headboard. He smiles endearingly at her as if he hasn't given her good cause to flinch. He sits on the bed, too close. She squeezes her legs shut, tucks them underneath herself, but he only slots himself into the available space. Maya looks up into his face, and something in her chest tightens when she meets his eyes. 

"Jimmy," she speaks, not stopping to consider altering her tone, "I want to make you a deal."

He raises his eyebrows, though his eyes seem not to register any surprise. "Are you in a position to be making me any offers?"

"I'll stay here with you," she blurts out, her voice bled dry of emotions.

Something shifts in his eyes, a relief, a hunger. "Yes?"

"If you let my friends go. If you set them free, you can keep me. I'll do anything."

Jimmy thinks of washing away the remnants of the five young lives from his hands, not an hour earlier. He knows what he has to do. It’ll kill off a part of him, and he knows what it’ll do to Maya. But he _must._ His resolve stiffens, and he adjusts his face to display the appropriate emotions, disguising his glee. “I know. I knew you would, because you’re so… _good._ That’s why I let them go, Maya. I doomed myself, I suppose, for you.”

“You…” Maya feels the flush of hope opening in her chest, and it hits her. “You already let them go?” _Oh, salvation. They’ll go down into the town, alert the locals, call the police-_

“Yes. If only they had half your heart, eh?”

Maya’s blood chills in her veins. _“What do you mean?”_ she demands sharply, although it’s beginning to set in her head, twilight bearing down over the sea.

Jimmy puts his hand on her knee, squeezing it, and she’s so caught up in the confusion that she doesn’t even flinch from it. His eyebrows draw together in sorrow, a sad smile spreading across his face. “Funny, isn’t it, how I’ve been the only one searching for you all this time, hm?”

Maya's on the verge of breaking down in front of this man. She can't. She _won't,_ not again.

"I don't understand, why...?"

Jimmy's grip on her tightens. "They've never been good enough for you, Maya," he says, tight-jawed. "They've never treated you the way you deserved. That first night you came here, for instance. You were soaked to the bone. They left you on the side of the road, in a storm. You were in such a state."

Maya doesn't remember being distraught - certainly irritated, but not necessarily upset. But now he says it... she remembers Hannah's phone call, how she didn't apologise, how she hung up so quickly...

"They're not coming back for you, Maya," Jimmy whispers, "and you're going to hold up your side of this bargain. You're going to stay here with me. And I'm going to take care of you, properly.

"No," Maya says, a hiss barely audible over the quiver of her breath. _No. No._

Jimmy doesn't even seem to notice her. He uses the hand on her knee to push it apart from the other, and moves between them. Maya shakes her head, everything overflowing, and he leans forward and kisses her hard on the mouth. She begins to silently cry. Jimmy tenses against her, pulls back and surveys her. As soon as he does so, she draws back from him as best she can.

“No, that won’t do. You’re supposed to _want_ this. Where's my tenacious girl gone?” He sits back, taking hold of her wrists, staring hard into her face. “Tell me you understand me,” he says, eagerly, voice straining, “you understand, Maya. I know it. I knew from the moment I saw you.”

His mouth quivers as he waits for a response, his eyes wide. Maya shakes her head. "It's too much. It's all too much."

"Maya," his voice drags into a desperate growl, his hands trembling around her wrists, gripping so tight it hurts.

"I understand." She says it because she fears what will happen otherwise.

Jimmy's mouth captures hers again, as if he is slowly, apologetically eating her alive.

When he draws back, his eyes are warm and full, glistening with tears. "I knew this would be perfect."

Maya stares back, eyes glassy, her mind shunting upwards, an elevator herself. She is leaving, she is leaving herself.

Forces separate from the mortal world are well equipped to interfere with it when needs be. In this, Maya's lowest moment, a familiar warmth presses against her, swarming her gently, flooding her with the sensation of being held. She leans into it as best she can. It's steadier than the heat of Jimmy's body. Softer than the press of his breath on her face. It holds her, and she knows that whatever happens to her here, she will live through it. She can't see the three figures moving into the room, wrapping her up in themselves as best they can, but she doesn't need to. This token of their unity serves its purpose. Close as Jimmy is, they will always be closer. 

Living or dead, those who haunt Sea View Hotel have always taken care of their own.

**Author's Note:**

> The series is DONE I can finally sleep now!! Thank you so much to everyone who read this, left kudos and commented love y'all mwah <3


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